been a few days

Just wanted to say a quick sorry for the lack of posts!  I was sick all weekend and wasn't feeling up to posting - nor did I have anything to post about.  I also haven't been feeling inspired lately again.  I promise that will change.

Today I ventured into "The Strand", the most amazing bookstore I have ever entered.  There are four floors (the top floor is all rare books!) and on the second floor, devoted mostly to the arts, had an extensive fashion section (not just a few shelves ... FOUR WHOLE BOOKCASES and a table of special releases.  It was incredible - coffee table books on every designer I could think of (including the more unusual, like Rei Kawakubo), tons of illustration books, and so forth.  I would have bought so many of them if I hadn't needed to carry them around all day afterwards (I did buy Lolita however, which I've wanted to read for ages). 

But while on the topic of books, there is a cute store I pass all the time walking home called "Cog and Pearl" and they have a book in the display window (they have lots of unusual jewelry, home goods, books, and decorating pieces with vintage/natural touches) that I can't stop looking at.  Finally I went in and opened it, and I decided I need it for a source of inspiration.  I'll end up buying it later, I'm sure (thought about it today but again, the matter of lugging it home took over) but it's called Albertus Seba's Cabinet of Natural Curiosities.  It's quite exactly how it sounds.

I think a wonderful world of inspiration can be drawn effortlessly from its pages.

The drawings are from the rare hand-drawn original by the Amsterdam pharmacist Seba.  As one of the greatest natural history achievements, it catalogs natural specimens in beautiful detail.  Don't you think this would be amazing to page through?

Cool fashion-related developments coming soon.